Is there any significance to the 3% cutoff, or did he just pick it arbitrarily so he could be depressing?
iirc, that’s about how much Trump outperformed polls.
He’s not wrong, given his carefully-chosen premise. The 2018 Senate races favor the GOP. And if things don’t change substantially from 2016, then, what a surprise, the Republicans will keep the House.
Now I’d be willing to bet things will change substantially from 2016. But it’s a useful thing to point out as a caution.
He’s pointing out how much gerrymandering favors the GOP. There would need to be a +6% margin for the Dems to break even in the House.
One poll recently (don’t have the link) had Dem’s up +14. Last time Dem’s took over ('06 I think) they were up +8-9. There is however a lot more headwind now - the aforementioned gerrymandering, voter suppression (or as I heard it described, voter theft), the unknown impacts of Sinclair broadcasting, and the robotic refrain proffered by corporate media and repeated without thought by many on the left that “Democrats don’t stand for anything.” One thing liberals are no slouch at is just how effective their circular firing squad is.
Good to see the GOP is just as loathsome at the local level!
This is a good read about possible 2020 candidates. I get the feeling that the Dems need some local wins, hopefully in 2018, before uniting behind national candidates.
For all the talk of taking back one house of congress or fending off the GOP widening their majority in the Senate in 2018, one thing has been curiously problematic: seemingly vulnerable Arizona senator Jeff Flake hadn’t attracted anyone of substance from the Democratic party as a challenger.
I mean, in Nevada, there are at least two strong challengers to Dean Heller. In Texas, Beto O’Rourke is at least raising money hand over fist. But in Arizona, where Flake may face a party primary challenge from the right, no one had stepped up.
Until this morning.
Kyrsten Sinema is apparently going to take a run at him. She’s the congresswoman from Arizona’s 9th district. In the past she’s called herself a “Prada socialist”, but in congress she’s been something of a moderate, a sort of Arizona blue dog. Which probably makes her perfect for this state.
In 2012 when Sinema first ran for congress, she barely won the district, and it took a hand count to affirm her as the winner a few days after election day. In 2014, she won re-election by 13 points. In 2016, she won by 22.
Game on.
With all the illegal voting crap the GOP is sure to have in place by next year, i can’t see the Democrats doing anything but losing seats in 2018.
Just to bring some potentially positive news (fair and balanced up in here!)
http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/346097-obama-to-reemerge-in-delicate-dance-with-dems
Former President Barack Obama will reemerge on the national scene this fall, though Democrats expect him to do so with caution.
One aide describes the beginning of a “delicate dance” that aims to put Obama in the Democratic fray but prevents him from remaining the face of the party.
Aides will huddle with Obama in the coming weeks to plot out what shape the former president’s fall schedule will take. Advisers close to him say that while he will play an active role in helping his party rebuild, much of his work will be behind the scenes.
So what’s the deal with Corey Booker? Why does the left consider him such a horrific sellout? He took big pharma money?
Are his presidential ambitions DOA, or what? And would it have made a damn difference if he had been Hillary’s running mate?
Ugh, that was a depressing read.
“The Democratic party is a den of thieves, and therefore Americans are going to have to abandon neoliberalism forever and embrace the need for radical socialism!”
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The Democratic party isn’t “criminally corrupt”. That’s a dumb talking point presented without evidence from someone who is letting anger cloud out sense.
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Most Americans don’t want socialism. They want capitalism. I think you can sell America on all sorts of regulations or taxes, especially when the changes are framed as a return to historic norms / “the good old days.” And hating on the banks will always be popular! But at the end of the day if you offer America a choice between “A drastic redistribution of wealth and a total overhaul of American capitalism” and “Trump 2020” I fear that Trump will prevail.
The left is on a big ideological purity bent, and they need to get over it.
Because while they’re boycotting senators who took lobbyist money, or who sided with the DNC over Bernie in 2016, or any of a hundred other purity metrics they come up with, the Republicans who have already compromised their values a thousand times over will be voting a Nazi into Congress or something just to make sure their side wins.
Given the rhetorical trendlines, it’s not hard to imagine openly white-supremacist candidates in the House within a few years.
We’re already there, man.
Links to big pharma and banks, positions to the right of Hillary economically. It’s a legit concern with him.
As for the purity bent, I notice it’s mostly establishment types saying that, and they’d be just as willing to threaten to walk if their folks lost, and throw in a dose of false accusations of bigotry to boot.
The insurgent branch needs to play ruthlessly to win in the primaries, though if they lose- then you fall in line. Not until then though.
The problem with this is every time someone questions the DNC establishment, this is the response. There is almost zero effort to court democrats by actually appealing to them. Instead it is always “I know i’m a giant douche but the other guy is a turd sandwich.”
So what we have is people like Corey Booker who take Big Pharma money and coincidentally vote against importing cheaper drugs from Canada. Then they turn around and rant about how bad purity tests are when someone calls them on their bullshit.
This isn’t going away and Trump has only brought corruption in politicians even more in to the light.
Perhaps even worse, it is a losing strategy. If the Democrats ignore the plight of the middle class again next election, they are going to lose to Trump, again.
I’m not a political strategist, but if I was, i also might suggest avoiding any connection to the last political election where a decent amount of people felt that the DNC ordained a candidate and shoved them down the throats of voters no matter what they wanted.
I really hope the DNC realizes why they lost to Trump, the second most unpopular candidate in history basically. However it seems like it is all denial and deflection still.
I think being ruthless during a primary is a very dangerous strategy. Inevitably some portion of the voting base will not fall in line, and will stay home or vote third party on election day. And a nasty campaign gives Republicans much better talking points than a clean primary.
Looking back at the 2016 primary, I would not draw the conclusion that Democratic candidates need to be more ruthless in challenging other Democrats.